Rosewood Race Massacre

A thriving town in Rosewood Florida was burned to the ground one hundred years ago.   Rosewood was an African-America town decimated by a violent white mob.  Violence broke out on January 1st, 1923 when a white women claimed she was assaulted by a black man.  The week long massacre resulted in the loss of homes, churches ,schools, and businesses.   In 1994, the Florida legislature passed a bill recognizing the event and compensating survivors' descendants.   CNN recently published an article highlighting this lesser know event in Ameican history.  

Tyrus Wong

Tyrus Wong was a Chinese immigrant artist in the early 1900's.  His artistic style and contributions to the world of art went unrecognized for decades.  Of all his work, Wong's contribution to the development of Bambi was most renowned.  He spent two years painting the illustrations for the Disney classic.  Other artists were taught to paint like him.  He endured racial bias for many years while developing beautiful works of art.  In 2001, Wong was finally acknowledged for his contributions as a Disney Legend. 

Radium Girls

 In 1917 hundreds of young women supported the war effort by working for the United States Radium Corporation.  The company produced watch dials for soldiers in the trenches of Europe.  The girls were paid well for dial painting and unaware of the damage they were causing to their bodies.  The long-term suffering these young women endured was horrific.  Read about the physicist Elizabeth Hughes who proved the dangers of radium.  Hughes was the unsung heroine for the Radium Girls.

Mine Okubo

Mine Okubo was a Japanese American who grew up in Riverside, California during World War II.  She was one of 110,000 Japanese Americans that were ordered into detention camps after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.  She was sent to a detention camp that was converted from a racetrack.  She was made to remain in a barn and sleep in a horse stall.  All internees were forbidden to use cameras so she recorded her interactions in charcoal and watercolor.   In 1946 her drawings and sketches were published in her book entitled Citizen 13660. It includes 200 illustrations with captions and is a great book to use when studying the home front during World War II.  She was recently highlighted in a New York Historical Society program.   

 

History Curriculums Need To Adjust

Michaela Wells' article History curriculums need to better include women discusses and supports the need to adjust history curriculums.  Young students need to study more significant contributions of women in U.S. History.  Her list of 20 women is fabulous and her survey speaks volumes.   

Pauli Murray

The life story of Pauli Murray was recently highlighted by the New York Historical Society.  The child of an interracial couple growing up in North Carolina, Pauli understood the cruelty of the Ku Klux Klan and Jim Crow laws.  She graduated high school at fifteen and enrolled in Hunter College in New York City, a racially integrated school.  While attending Hunter College, Murray began cutting her hair short and wearing pants instead of skirts.  She began to see herself as a man.  She spent hours at counseling due to mental breakdowns.  There were very few supports for anyone who did not align with society's expectations at the time.  As a poor woman of color she saw firsthand how race and gender dictate the way people are treated in society.  

In 1938, she enrolled at Howard University to continue her education.  While attending Howard University she formulated the concept of Jane Crow to describe the double discrimination of black women.   A turning point in her life was when she was appointed the first African American Deputy Attorney General for the state of California.  Her experience as Attorney General brought her into contact with many civil rights leaders and inspired her to write a book on the complexities of legal segregation. 

Mamie Johnson

 Mamie Johnson played baseball for the Indianapolis Clowns in the Negro Leagues.   In 1953, at the age of 18, she was scouted by the Clowns.  She was one of only three women to play professional men's baseball. The integration of the Negro Leagues and the Major leagues shortened her career to three years.  Her inspirational story is written in a novel entitled A Strong Right Arm by Michelle Y. Green.  In 2008, Major League Baseball arranged a Negro League Draft in which all surviving Negro Leagues players were drafted by Major league teams.  Johnson was drafted to the Washington Nationals.  

Claudette Colvin

Claudette Colvin's record was recently expunged. Read about Colvin and Elizabeth Jennings who were both anti-segregation pioneers who are often overlooked.